Part 4 (1/2)
”Have any taken it up to the present?” asked Yeovil.
”Only about nineteen, so far, and none of them representing very leading families; of course others will come in gradually, as the change of Dynasty becomes more and more an accepted fact, and of course there will be lots of new creations to fill up the gaps. I hear for certain that Pitherby is to get a t.i.tle of some sort, in recognition of his literary labours. He has written a short history of the House of Hohenzollern, for use in schools you know, and he's bringing out a popular Life of Frederick the Great--at least he hopes it will be popular.”
”I didn't know that writing was much in his line,” said Yeovil, ”beyond the occasional editing of a company prospectus.”
”I understand his historical researches have given every satisfaction in exalted quarters,” said Joan; ”something may be lacking in the style, perhaps, but the august approval can make good that defect with the style of Baron. Pitherby has such a kind heart; 'kind hearts are more than coronets,' we all know, but the two go quite well together. And the dear man is not content with his services to literature, he's blossoming forth as a liberal patron of the arts. He's taken quite a lot of tickets for dear Gorla's debut; half the second row of the dress-circle.”
”Do you mean Gorla Mustelford?” asked Yeovil, catching at the name; ”what on earth is she having a debut about?”
”What?” cried Joan, in loud-voiced amazement; ”haven't you heard? Hasn't Cicely told you? How funny that you shouldn't have heard. Why, it's going to be one of the events of the season. Everybody's talking about it. She's going to do suggestion dancing at the Caravansery Theatre.”
”Good Heavens, what is suggestion dancing?” asked Yeovil.
”Oh, something quite new,” explained Joan; ”at any rate the name is quite new and Gorla is new as far as the public are concerned, and that is enough to establish the novelty of the thing. Among other things she does a dance suggesting the life of a fern; I saw one of the rehearsals, and to me it would have equally well suggested the life of John Wesley.
However, that is probably the fault of my imagination--I've either got too much or too little. Anyhow it is an understood thing that she is to take London by storm.”
”When I last saw Gorla Mustelford,” observed Yeovil, ”she was a rather serious flapper who thought the world was in urgent need of regeneration and was not certain whether she would regenerate it or take up miniature painting. I forget which she attempted ultimately.”
”She is quite serious about her art,” put in Cicely; ”she's studied a good deal abroad and worked hard at mastering the technique of her profession. She's not a mere amateur with a hankering after the footlights. I fancy she will do well.”
”But what do her people say about it?” asked Yeovil.
”Oh, they're simply furious about it,” answered Joan; ”the idea of a daughter of the house of Mustelford prancing and twisting about the stage for Prussian officers and Hamburg Jews to gaze at is a dreadful cup of humiliation for them. It's unfortunate, of course, that they should feel so acutely about it, but still one can understand their point of view.”
”I don't see what other point of view they could possibly take,” said Yeovil sharply; ”if Gorla thinks that the necessities of art, or her own inclinations, demand that she should dance in public, why can't she do it in Paris or even Vienna? Anywhere would be better, one would think, than in London under present conditions.”
He had given Joan the indication that she was looking for as to his att.i.tude towards the fait accompli. Without asking a question she had discovered that husband and wife were divided on the fundamental issue that underlay all others at the present moment. Cicely was weaving social schemes for the future, Yeovil had come home in a frame of mind that threatened the destruction of those schemes, or at any rate a serious hindrance to their execution. The situation presented itself to Joan's mind with an alluring piquancy.
”You are giving a grand supper-party for Gorla on the night of her debut, aren't you?” she asked Cicely; ”several people spoke to me about it, so I suppose it must be true.”
Tony Luton and young Storre had taken care to spread the news of the projected supper function, in order to ensure against a change of plans on Cicely's part.
”Gorla is a great friend of mine,” said Cicely, trying to talk as if the conversation had taken a perfectly indifferent turn; ”also I think she deserves a little encouragement after the hard work she has been through.
I thought it would be doing her a kindness to arrange a supper party for her on her first night.”
There was a moment's silence. Yeovil said nothing, and Joan understood the value of being occasionally tongue-tied.
”The whole question is,” continued Cicely, as the silence became oppressive, ”whether one is to mope and hold aloof from the national life, or take our share in it; the life has got to go on whether we partic.i.p.ate in it or not. It seems to me to be more patriotic to come down into the dust of the marketplace than to withdraw oneself behind walls or beyond the seas.”
”Of course the industrial life of the country has to go on,” said Yeovil; ”no one could criticise Gorla if she interested herself in organising cottage industries or anything of that sort, in which she would be helping her own people. That one could understand, but I don't think a cosmopolitan concern like the music-hall business calls for personal sacrifices from young women of good family at a moment like the present.”
”It is just at a moment like the present that the people want something to interest them and take them out of themselves,” said Cicely argumentatively; ”what has happened, has happened, and we can't undo it or escape the consequences. What we can do, or attempt to do, is to make things less dreary, and make people less unhappy.”
”In a word, more contented,” said Yeovil; ”if I were a German statesman, that is the end I would labour for and encourage others to labour for, to make the people forget that they were discontented. All this work of regalvanising the social side of London life may be summed up in the phrase 'travailler pour le roi de Prusse.'”
”I don't think there is any use in discussing the matter further,” said Cicely.
”I can see that grand supper-party not coming off,” said Joan provocatively.